More importantly, Japan has already said they will consider an attack on Taiwan as a threat to their national security and invoke Article 9.

And the simple fact is the vast, overwhelming majority of US citizens are not only in favor of arming Ukraine, but arming it with heavier weapons. People on here can think whatever they want about that fact, but you have to operate in the facts as they exist.

What was imperfect about it? At least according to Legal Mindset (who’s area of expertise is Florida Special District law), DeSantis pretty much did everything he could have to Disney, and didn’t really miss any beats.

Not necessarily, but they have engaged in gross ballet stuffing that is probably on par in terms of faked votes. The issue with with trying to pull that sort of stuff outside of smaller local elections in the US (which is partly why places like Chicago and NYC have been Dem for 100+ years) is two-fold historically speaking:

1. Its EXPENSIVE to pull of that much bullshit, so it has a tendency of "It works until it doesnt." And the bigger the gap they have to overcome, the more expensive it gets.

2. There is actually a tendency of the person who got screwed to come roaring back and win their next go around because they and their supporters are pissed by being cheated. Both Andrew Jackson and Richard Nixon were screwed out of the presidency by cheating, and both of them won their next elections in overwhelming landslides, after their supporters won Congressional seats and raised hell against the ones who screwed them.

Incidentally, on that note, if we are going with my "Nu-70's" timeline, we are already doing better in that regard. Because Carter and the Dems gained seats in the 1978 midterm, even in the face of Carter's historically low approval and a general distaste about the direction of the country. At least with 2022, the Republicans actually got a [narrow] House majority.

JFK and the mob say "Nixon was properly paranoid." Tammany Hall says "Are we a joke to you?" The Dems even back in the Civil War era say "It's just that easy."

The Democrats have been stuffing ballots literally since their founding. They have never stopped. Its just a matter of getting someone so overwhelming popular it overwhelms their attempts to rig it.

I am sure some on here would not agree, but I still stand by the theory of the world going forward that was laid out in a video I watched about a year ago. The TLDR is here, but I believe it because many of those have already started happening.

As for the culture war itself, I think we have already passed peak woke. With the lag that exist in the movie industry, most of what we have been seeing come out was done in 2018-2020, at the height of TDS and Woke Outrage. But according to people in the industry (like Chris Gore), many of these companies are starting to walk back their policies.

They cant keep denying the success of things like Top Gun, or that Disney has lost ground to Illumination and Dreamworks (who had successful animated movies while Disney bombed last year). They cant keep denying that foreign entertainment like Manga, Anime, and even foreign movies are starting to make a dent if they havent eaten significant chunks (apparently RRR being a financial success rattled them). And no matter how much their PR and Marketing teams try to tell them otherwise, they can no longer deny that Woke is failing. Or did you think it a coincidence that PR/HR/Marketing are the ones getting slammed in the current layoffs. Think of the upcoming D&D movie: Yes, we know that everything they are doing is woke, no matter how much they are trying to deny it. But that they are desperately trying to deny it (including by name!) shows that they realize being called "woke" is brand poison, and they will try to avoid it. We arent at the point yet where they know what it means to avoid it, but they are trying.

Meanwhile, you are starting to see more and more "anti-woke" appearing spaces. Not necessarily "based", and dont expect that to change yet. But consider that one of the biggest songs on the radio for a significant time was an explicitly anti-woke song, and its not the only one.

Until I see solid evidence to the contrary, I stand by my theory that we are living in the "History doesnt repeat, it rhymes" version of the 1970's. We have Black Nationalist movements in ascendance thinking that they can go genocide Whitey and implement their tribal utopia (with growing resentment towards blacks from every other race due to that fact). We have unrestrained crime and drugs in the big cities. We have domestic politicians and business leaders trying to sell us out to our enemies for their own personal gain, even though the people dont want that. And on and on. The only difference is that in the '70's, film had started moving out of the Hayes Code era into an era of Classics, so we are behind the ball on that one. But I think 2020 was, much like 1976, their last shove they could do. And now 2024 will be the pushback. Who will be Reagan in this theory? Dont know, but personally I think its leaning toward DeSantis with Trump being the "Nixon".

EDIT: I would like to say though: This theory all applies to the United States. The simple fact of the matter is Europe never recovered mentally from the World Wars and has been in the equivalent of civilizational-level depression since, and it really does seem like they want to die. Meanwhile, the US has been characterized by going down kicking and screaming and actually putting up a fight to where they might take back the power.

that Curly was a symbol of awful management and George and Lennie were average put upon workers.

The other fun one I remember hearing about was that the Soviets believed the same thing, and had the play presented in Russia. It was intended to be done to show "Look at the decadent Americans, and how poorly they treat their workers that they must be in these conditions! Remember yourselves as the new Soviet Man!"

Meanwhile, the Russian citizens saw it and thought "Holy shit, they own their own truck! Lucky bastards."

See also: Romania allowing the TV show Dallas to be broadcast in the country, with similar attempts at a message and outcome among the citizens.

There are also lots of little things that most normal people dont think about but are actually extremely important for a proper fighting machine. For instance, the Sherman had some of the best optics for any tank in WW2, and they only got better as the design got more advanced. So for all of the old myths about how dangerous it was, actual combat stats show it was a killing machine because it almost always got the first shot off due to actually being able to see. Even in Korea, Shermans usually won against T-34's, because as it turns out the T-34 was actually not a great tank (it just fit the Soviet "Brute force them to death with numbers" doctrine).

This is before we get into the data about how for all the "deathtrap" talk, the Sherman was hands down the most survivable tank of the war unless you were in a British-crewed Sherman (British Shermans being responsible for a ton of the myths around it, that didnt carry over to American Shermans).

She was claiming the Soviets won WW2 because they lost millions of people.

They always forget (or chose to not remember) that Russia was a huge recipient of Lend Lease. Almost all of their aviation fuel, the vast majority of their trucks and trains, and most of their uniforms were made in the US. They also got a lot of US and British tanks and planes, and in some cases even preferred them over the Russian gear, like preferring the P-39/63 fighter as well as the Sherman and Valentine tanks (even though their propaganda obviously wouldnt talk about that).

And look at the war now, and you can see what that does with even just a fraction of Lend Lease, on top of Russian logistics being perma-fucked like it has been for their entire history (meanwhile, the US is learning how to weaponize its logistics, since logistics has always been the secret weapon of the US).

I need to go back and find the specific video, but the two sources I use for insider stuff like that are Valliant Renegade and WDW Pro for my sources on that.

Valliant has his opinions on culture war stuff (he leans our way), but he is far more concerned with the financials since he thinks all of the woke and ESG last as long as they think they can stop the bleeding. And since he does financial work as his day job, he knows a lot of companies are starting to kick it to the curb, and Disney is actually the oddball for trying to go full ride or die on ESG.

Pro is a guy who has insider sources at Disney, but unlike a lot of others he only makes a point if he can back it up. So on multiple occasions he has thrown cold water on people running around hyping up rumors that he already knows arent true (including calling out Doomcock by name for always jumping at every shadow instead of doing research, as much as he likes him).

Both of them have typically been ahead of the curve on some of this stuff. They were also my primary source (including Legal Mindset) for what would end up happening with Reedy Creek, and everything Mindset said would happen did (almost like his dayjob is "one of a few dozen lawyers in Florida who specialize in Special District Law.").

EDIT: Found a clip of them discussing it. Essentially, it would allow people to start getting some money flowing in since they arent doing anything with it right now, and lets them get around issues with their in-house talent being so terrible. Then they can still take all of the credit. It wasnt brought up by them, but just look at the fact that Star Wars: Visions (which was all independent stories that were just licensed under Star Wars) was one of the first immensely popular things Disney did with it in a long time.

I am standing by my theory that SVB going under will be great news in the long run. You already had companies moving away from ESG shit because no matter how much money was pumped in, it was never enough to keep them alive and solvent. And now that one of the financial engines that was propping it all up has gone tits up themselves? Any company that is not ideologically suicidal is going to change course.

Disney still may go down that road, because even though the scuttlebutt is that Iger wants to turn back, his own woke subordinates he put in dont. What is that saying again? Something about petards?

Millennials racking up more chronic health conditions than previous generations. This is because previous generations had more exercise, less diseases recognized by doctors, and a walk it off attitude.

So what I am hearing is my even basic exercise and hostility toward doctors is going to result in me being the most ripped Millennial. Because I will be able to actually move at a reasonable clip and am resilient to most illness because I home remedy that shit instead of going to the doctor (we are talking: I dont go to the doctor short of a major injury, and I still usually go with the attitude of "Give me a stick and some duct tape and I will fix it right.)

Avatar could replace Star Wars at Disney Parks.

Well, that backs up the rumors that Disney is going to start licensing out Star Wars to be produced by other studios (like Favreau Fairview Entertainment), since they think they cant make their own Star Wars.

But can they actually shoot?

Because I have seen plenty of video of Antifa types who had guns that were perfectly fine in terms of all that stuff, and then they struggled to hit a target at 50 yards.

At least with Katara, it was believable and in character, rather than forced. Since if we are being honest, a lot of the hate for Woke stuff starts with it being forced.

Plus she was balanced out by Toph existing, so there is that too.

I would definitely recommend looking into episodes then, if you are worried about that. There are a few instances of death shown, but they try to leave it as "implied" as possible. IE: they blow up a mountain that is being climbed by tanks with cables, and after the massive explosion you see the cables dangling in the wind. What happened to the tanks? Dont think about it too much.

Some of the spiritual monsters that can appear in the show can also be a little on the extreme side. Probably one of the ones I remember as standing out the most is "Koh, the Face Stealer", which is a centipede-esque eldritch monstrosity that rapidly changes its faces, with said faces being stolen from anyone who shows emotions around it.

There were some episodes and themes that would probably make it extreme for small children (in like the 3rd episode, you see a mass pile of skeletons from a massacred temple, and war is a central theme).

But for older children? Highly recommended. The female characters are able to be strong without giving up being feminine, almost all characters are competent (even the comic relief guy has plenty of moments where he gets serious), the villains have reasonable and understandable motives, many villains get redemption through their actions, etc.

There is a reason that even almost 10 years later, it is considered one of the most popular shows of a generation.

I dont see what the problem is. That would be hilarious to have a team named the Caucasians.

Maybe we can just take a joke better?

Being very mercenary about the issue helps. Every once in a while, they will make something woke, it sells poorly, and they say "Well, so much for that" and go back to what works. And if you try to force it again, they will ask "But will it make money?"

Even that is not entirely true. They are only sex positive if it is women doing it for other women! They always get upset if a man likes it. Ironically, also getting mad at Bisexual women who like it, since they usually like the same things as men.

Correct. There is absolutely a lot of fanservice present, and the author has openly admitted as such. But while it is slightly above average amounts of fanservice by anime standards, like you said they are usually pivotal to the plot. Which is far more than can be said of many anime where the women are just there as eye candy.

Japs be like "we just want to make money".

I mean, even for the Right that is all it would take. Blaine Pardoe is an open Right-Winger and he isnt really putting that into his newest book. Just a "Inspired by Tom Clancy" story of mech pilots defending the Earth from Aliens, which he is designing as a counter to Battletech (which he was kicked out of).

What we really need is to get past the point where you have all of these Right-Wing people who still think of things like comics and video games as "for children/childish."

From comments:

Even as a straight guy, I get a little tired of the gratuitous sexiness.

As someone who also gets tired of gratuitous sexiness (to the point I vastly prefer women in armor over the "chainmail bikini" look): If you consider anything in MHA to be "gratuitous", you have far too narrow of standards.

It will never stop being strange to me that the Leftist are simultaneously obnoxiously sex-positive and sex-negative at the same time.

Add Victoria to that list for an econ lesson and you would have a well balanced Renaissance Man.....wait.

Depends on which ones you get though. I know there were some people complaining about the fact that the teaser for Cities Skylines 2 that drop the other day seemed "too car-centric", and upset that there were not as many options for creating a "walkable city."

Meanwhile, like I said: You get a bus stop, an in-district tram (for high-density districts), a metro/subway, and an intracity train when I am in a late game city. If that is not enough "walking" for you, I dont know what to tell you. Guess go live in the "walkable zone" with the Hippies, because the rest of the city will have 6-lane roads and highways connecting everything.

Here.

Considering I have seen 'incel' used as an insult against people who are married and have children? Yeah, they dont know.

Pippa gets her humor from 4chan and the Farms. Any attempt to cancel her would probably result in more followers for her, since that is literally her audience.

Also, note that Pippa got more engagement on her post than Gura usually does, despite the fact Gura is one of, if not the, most subscribed English Vtubers out there.

Fair point, and I do agree Knowles would be good for moving the Overton window back in that direction. But the reality of the situation is that the extreme edge you have to start with is "Will Misgender You", and start working back toward the center. Especially right now that there are a ton of people suddenly open to that view due to the Harry Potter shitshow.

And then once they are at the "Misgender" position, you start showing them Knowles and he starts telling them "But is it even real?"